SEO Strategy for
Websites & Blogs
WordCamp Raleigh
Jake Aull | ZenFires Digital Marketing | SEO & Websites | Social Media & Branding
404.259.5550 | ZenFires.com | jake@zenfires.com | @jakeaull

SEO Strategy for
Websites & Blogs
Find the following presentation & others
referenced here on
www.slideshare.net/jakeaull
Jake Aull has written WordPress SEO
Success for Pearson Prentice-Hall – their
first book of its kind (http://bit.ly/1fxIQzu).
He has also been GSU’s first Social Media
Marketing and SEO course writer and
instructor since 2010, directing students to
create new social channels driving
measurable traffic to major brands. He was
a reviewer of, and wrote the instructor’s
manual for, Pearson-Prentice Hall’s first
social media marketing text book.

! T.O.C.
! Digital Marketing & SEO Objectives
! SEO Strategy & Plan
! Architecture & Linking
! Social Media
! SEO Stages of Execution
! SEO Details – Breakdown of Stages
! Review
Intro…

Questions & Planning
Jake Aull

! One big happy/dysfunctional family?
! Digital research
! Technical/code integrations
! Content planning/writing
! Off-site implementations (i.e., backlinks)
! Social media integrations
! Location directories and profiles
! “Making Google Happy”
What’s SEO & How Does it Apply to You?

! Goals?
! SEO
! Marketing/digital
! Content/social
! Strategy
! Tactical
implementations
! Content channels
integrations
! Analytics
! Proving goals results
Driving Questions

! Nature of website
! Brochureware
! eCommerce
! Blog/magazine
! Forum/social site
! Advertising/landing page
! Directory
! Mobile (all websites today need to be mobile
responsive)
! **(Note: Plenty more website types in the book WordPress SEO Success)
Driving Questions

Digital Marketing & SEO
Objectives
Jake Aull | Zen Fires Digital Marketing | SEO & Websites | Social Media & Branding
404.259.5550 | ZenFires.com | jake@zenfires.com | @jakeaull

- Page rank
- Top/first page results goals (specific keywords)
- PPC and first-page real estate
- Total SERP coverage (& brand mentions)
- Competitive
- Suppress bad reviews (reputation management)
- Location-based SEO
- First-time search or new site (& brandname SEO)
- Social Media Optimization
SEO (& PPC) Objectives

SEO Stages of Execution
Jake Aull | Zen Fires Digital Marketing | SEO & Websites | Social Media & Branding
404.259.5550 | ZenFires.com | jake@zenfires.com | @jakeaull

! Strategy & Discovery
! Keyword Analysis & discovery
! Marketing strategic alignment
! SEO plan
! Keyword/copywriting plan
! Implementation & Programming
! Coding keywords & tags
! Robots.txt file
! Sitemap.xml
! Canonicalization
! Redirects
! Search engine integrations
! Analytics integrations & auto-reporting
! Geo-local integrations
! Google Images, video, etc.
The Stages of SEO

! Off-site Activities
! Local directories set-up
! Submission to social bookmarking sites
& blog search engines
! Articles & PR publishing
! Obtaining one-way
inbound links
! Ongoing Maintainance
! Add new/SEO new content
! Reviewing analytics
! Checking for search
engine errors
The Stages of SEO

SEO Content Strategy
Jake Aull | Zen Fires Digital Marketing | SEO & Websites | Social Media & Branding
404.259.5550 | ZenFires.com | jake@zenfires.com | @jakeaull

! PROBLEMS TO SOLVE:
! BENEFITS:
! Why should customers visit our site or buy our product?
! WHAT IS THE BRAND PERSONALITY WE WANT TO PROJECT?
! Tone of copy:
! MARKETING/DIGITAL STRATEGY:
! Existing:
! Proposed:
! POSITIONING STATEMENT OR USP:
Keyword Discovery & Content Strategy

! TARGET AUDIENCE:
! CURRENT TARGET CUSTOMER BELIEF
! CURRENT TARGET CUSTOMER CLICKING/BUYING BEHAVIOR
! DESIRED FUTURE CUSTOMER BELIEF
! DESIRED FUTURE CUSTOMER CLICKING/BUYING BEHAVIOR
! WHY SHOULD CUSTOMER BEHAVE THIS WAY?
! TARGET CUSTOMER INSIGHT:
! KEYWORDS:
! Previous website & competitor keywords
! Client list
! Post-analysis recommendations
Customer Targeting & Journey

SEO & Site Architecture
Jake Aull | ZenFires Digital Marketing | SEO & Websites | Social Media & Branding
404.259.5550 | ZenFires.com | jake@zenfires.com | @jakeaull

SEO
Sitemap
guide
for
20-­‐25pg
website
Home
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
main
naviga,on
Floor
Services
Success
Stories
Who
We
Serve
About
Acme
Floor
Floorwork
Photos
Contact
News
&
Blog
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Hardwood
Floor
Case
Studies
Commercial
Floors
Hardwood Experts Hardwood Photos Direc,ons
Press
|
|
|
|
|
|
Home
Carpet
Tes,monials
Home
Flooring
Carpet Experts Carpet Images Decor
Blog
|
|
|
|
Office
Floors
Decor
Partners
Mission/vision Business Floors
(footer
menu):
Home
-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐
-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐
-­‐-­‐
Legal?
LEGEND:
Box
item
=
menu/sub
menu
item
Do.ed
box
=
possible,
future
menu
item?
Green
&/or
italic
text
=
Descripter
text
not
going
on
website

Site architecture planning
• Plan your website upfront for keyword-driven
pages
• The power of the Footer navigation
• Linking throughout the site:
• It sounds cumbersome, but plan links through
every page and blog post of your site if possible.
When you write up your sitemap, plan which pages
you want to link to the next, and so on and so on.
• Link planning doesn’t require a long list of links
on your website’s pages!
• Target a primary link (maybe 2 or 3)
to show, and push web users
continually through your site.
• In a perfect world, every page/post gets 1 link.

Site architecture planning
• Blog/news:
• This can especially work for the
blog section of your site – you
can continually link to/from those
posts to distribute link juice.
• Mobile sites
• Nav/architecture
• Most important content
(keyword-focused)
• Local apps integrated
(Apple maps, Google maps)

! Link Building:
! Quality and relevance over quantity
! Press release/white paper placement
! Local SEO
! Social media
! Ideal to obtain inbound links without exchanging equal two-way links
! (Never buy links!!! And note that too much, or bad, link building will hurt
you! Be careful)
! Brand-side SEO simplified
! Copywriters who know your industry best
! Keyword evaluation
! Monitoring
! Sharing/link building
! Industry directories, trade shows, etc.
Off-Site Links & Brand-Owned

! Inbound web links (a.k.a. backlinks and referrals) are
helpful. Here's why:
! They increase paths to the target – more ways and
places for visitors to find the site.
! They create alternative entry paths for crawlers to
specific web pages (even when the target site is not
optimized for search engines).
! Good ones do help search rankings (if they’re one
way/inbound).
Inbound & Social Links for SEO

! Inbound links represent a solid, alternative (to in-site)
web metric. They gauge the content value and referral
traffic of a site in the online marketplace (especially
valuable if there are issues with existing in-site SEO
or analytics).
! They also can be alternate drivers to lead-gen pages.
! They get shared among
web users and multiplicity
of network effects occurs.
Inbound & Social Links for SEO

Relational Relevant Links
• What Google looks for:
• Do the sites and links relate
to each other?
• Are the directories relevant?
• Vertical (industry nice) vs. locational relevance
• Local channels are very beneficial.
• Even if you are an eCommerce, if you have a location
I would still consider optimizing location-based
profiles. Because Google loves Google+Local. And Bing
loves Bing Local and Yahoo!Local.
• And have you ever searched for any businesses or
products, only to see Yelp and YP listings on first page
of results? They’re there – use them if you can.

*Link Addendum
! *Want to know more about Link Strategies? Did you
know what Anchor Text is? Did you know to no longer
make anchor text keyword rich? If you want more, see
my webinar hosted by SEMrush on SEO Link Strategies
& Anchor Text, or see my sources: ow.ly/DK7oq

SEO Plan Inputs
Jake Aull | ZenFires Digital Marketing | SEO & Websites | Social Media & Branding
404.259.5550 | ZenFires.com | jake@zenfires.com | @jakeaull

! Resources
! Personnel
! Roles
! Content sources
! Sites/Technology
in-place
! Keyword Research
Plan Inputs

! Depth for Execution
! Amount of pages/content
! Non-Text Opportunities
! Image
! Video
! Audio
! Social integrations
! Plugins
! Mobile
Plan Inputs

! How much do you actually know?
! How much time do you have?
! How many people are helping?
! Will you break the
site &/or Google?
Know Your Limits

! Technology:
! Google AdWords Keyword Research Tool (best data)
! Bing Webmaster Tools
! Other keyword/SEO research tools such as SEMrush (good
spy data) and KeywordSpy (easy, but less accurate data)
! Social media keyword research such as SocialMention.com
! Competitive analysis/keywords
! Competitors
! Industry thought-leaders/bloggers
! Comparable industry digital marketing leaders
! Organic, PPC and social
Keyword Research Inputs

! Your website historical analytics
! Past organic keywords
! Favorite pages of your site
! Blog categories/tags
! Your past PPC performance
! (even if flawed)
! Your social media top clicks/likes/shares
Keyword Research Inputs

Content Strategy & SEO
Process
Jake Aull | Zen Fires Digital Marketing | SEO & Websites | Social Media & Branding
404.259.5550 | ZenFires.com | jake@zenfires.com | @jakeaull

The importance of good
Keyword drivers
• Good copywriting is vital – and can be used in
conjunction with good keywords!
• Copywriting can be built on primary keywords for a
page/post.
• Find the junction of readability, SEO, copy hooks and
website usability
• Link bait:
• Good writing intrigues readers
to read on and share your link
• CTAs:
• You need good calls-to-action –
ensure your reader takes the next step
and links to where you drive them!*
*(for more see my aforementioned SEMrush webinar at ow.ly/DK7oq)

! Web page titles and relevant copy (semantic content)
! You can search for your blog phrase in search engine…
! Web writing with keywords
! Writing for audience or writing for search engines?
! Tone and positiveness
! No stealth blogging
! Clickstream and customer journey
! Why Blog?
! “Blogging” for both search engines and purchase decisions
! Social media content and relevance†
†(for more on this, see my WordCamp Atlanta presentation on Social Media Uses for WordPress Sites
http://bit.ly/1IFiyKb)
Writing & Keywords

SEO Web Page Plan

Strategic content managers
• The emphasis on content, and link,
quality has helped drive the new
generation of “content managers.”
• Whether using social media, copywriting,
video or SEO technology, content to meet
digital marketing goals is the strategy.
• And today, it’s a strategy more of quality
than quantity – for Google and for social
media engagement.
• So today we want “link engagement;” backlinks from social engagement
strategies, relevant content and referral sites – everything we’ve
discussed here.†
†(for more on this, see my WordCamp Atlanta presentation on Social Media Uses for WordPress Sites http://bit.ly/1IFiyKb)

SEO Details –
Breakdown of Stages
Jake Aull | Zen Fires Digital Marketing | SEO & Websites | Social Media & Branding
404.259.5550 | ZenFires.com | jake@zenfires.com | @jakeaull

! Content/Inputs:
! Client measurement assessment
! SEO goals discovery
! Client-provided keywords assessed
! Content/keyword analysis of past client site
! Keyword research, analysis and comparison
! Tools:
! Pro SEO tools utilized: Google AdWords keyword planner tool, SEO Book Tools, iSpionage, Open
Site Explorer
! .xls report downloads, aggregated spreadsheets
! Reports/Outputs:
! Competitor ranking report
! Backlinks
! Keyword effectiveness index/ranking reports
! Head and long-tail keyword weighting for optimal keywords/phrases
! KPIs and measurement plan
! SEO/keyword plans
Keyword Discovery & Optimization

! Site Integrations & Submissions:
! Search engine submissions and verifications (Google, Bing,
Yahoo!)
! Additional search engine tools implementations (e.g.,
Google Webmaster tools, Google Analytics)
! Analytics:
! KPI plan integration
! Keyword monitoring
set-up (e.g., Google
Alerts, SocialMention)
! Google analytics set-up
! Website auto reports
set-up
Website Submissions & Analytics Implementations

! Robots.txt file creation/upload
! Sitemap.xml file created for search engines
! Maps/geo-local website tools integrations
! Website SEO implementation:
! title
! meta description
! meta keywords
! H1s/H2s (headlines)
! text editing
! Anchor links
! Image alt tags
SEO Website Development/Programming Aspects

Example: Does Meta Description matter?
Company 3 has a
confusing meta
description – your
first intro to the
website.
Zen Fires Digital Marketing | jake@zenfires.com

SEO Lead-Gen Funnel Analytics

Review & Questions?
Jake Aull | Zen Fires Digital Marketing | SEO & Websites | Social Media & Branding
404.259.5550 | ZenFires.com | jake@zenfires.com | @jakeaull

! Why is it important to identify and align marketing
and SEO objectives?
! Importance of Architecture & Linking
! How to form SEO Strategy & Plan
! What are the major stages of SEO execution?
! Find this presentation & others referenced here on www.slideshare.net/jakeaull
Review of Topics

Questions?
Find this presentation & others referenced here on
www.slideshare.net/jakeaull
Jake Aull, Principal of Zen Fires Digital Marketing since 2010, has 20
years marketing, branding and digital experience in Atlanta. He takes a
strategic digital marketing and usability approach to web analysis and
search marketing. He has a Masters of Science degree in Marketing
from Georgia State University where he did a thesis research project
on social media marketing.
Jake has written WordPress SEO Success for Pearson Prentice-Hall -
their first book of its kind (http://bit.ly/1fxIQzu). He has also been
GSU’s first Social Media Marketing and SEO course writer and
instructor since 2010, directing students to create new social channels
driving measurable traffic to major brands. He was a reviewer of, and
wrote the instructor’s manual for, Pearson-Prentice Hall’s first social
media marketing text book.

Thank You!
Jake Aull | Zen Fires Digital Marketing | SEO & Websites | Social Media & Branding
404.259.5550 | ZenFires.com | jake@zenfires.com | @jakeaull